State v. HayesState v. Hayes
OPINION
A jury found appellant Christopher James Hayes guilty of first-degree felony murder while committing a drive-by shooting and second-degree intentional murder. The district court convicted Hayes of first-degree felony murder and sentenced him to life imprisonment with the possibility of release. Hayes challenges his conviction on two grounds. First, he argues that the record contains insufficient evidence to sustain his conviction. Second, he contends that the court committed reversible error whеn it admitted testimony at trial that a witness was threatened and attacked for being a “snitch.” We conclude that the evidence was insufficient to prove that Hayes committed a drive-by shooting, but reject Hayes’s evidentiary challenge. We therefore reverse Hayes’s conviction of first-degree felony murder and remand to the district court with instructions to enter a judgment of conviction and impose sentence on the second-degree intentional murder count.
I.
The Stаte filed a criminal complaint charging Hayes with one count of second-
At approximately 11:15 a.m. on September 17, T.S. was visiting a house on Colfax Avenue North. A short time later, T.S. notiсed a red car approach the intersection of 30th Avenue North and Colfax Avenue North. She saw three men inside the car: the driver, a front seat passenger, and a back seat passenger who sat directly behind the front seat passenger. The windows of the red car were not tinted and the front seat passenger looked directly at T.S. Thus, T.S. observed details about the front seat passenger’s appearance — including his facial hair, complexion, size, and clothing. During a photographic lineup at the police station after the shooting and at Hayes’s trial, T.S. identified the front seat passenger as Hayes. T.S. was unable to identify the car’s driver.
T.S. watched Hayes grab the shirt of the back seat passenger and point a dark silver gun at him. Hayes then glanced at T.S., who turned around and started walking away from the car. As T.S. walked away, she heard a loud “popping” sound consistent with a gunshot. After hearing the “popping” sound, T.S. glanced back toward the intersection and saw the back seat passenger exit the car, run across the street while holding his chest, and eventually collapse on the sidewalk on the northeast side of the intersection. The car then drove away.
A short time later, Minneapolis police arrived at the scene of the shooting, where officers found a body — later identified as Christopher DeRonde — near the northeast side of the intersection. DeRonde was deаd by the time the police arrived. The police later interviewed T.S., who described what she saw and heard before, during, and after the shooting. Two other witnesses also heard a gunshot, but neither saw the shooting occur.
Although the police did not find any spent casings at the scene, an autopsy conducted by the Hennepin County medical examiner determined that DeRonde died as the result of a single gunshot wound. The characteristics of the entry wound revealed that the shooter fired the gun from no more than three or four feet away from DeRonde. The medical examiner testified at Hayes’s trial that the bullet’s trajectory through DeRonde’s body was consistent with the theory that DeR-onde was “leaning over” to get out of the car when the shooter fired at DeRonde.
Four days after the shooting, Minneapolis Police Sergeant Ann Kjos learned that police officers had stopped a red Dodge Intrepid that matched the car depicted in surveillance video footage from the date and location of the murder. At the time of the stop, the car’s driver was Michael Funches, Jr. and Hayes was in the passenger seat. The police seized the car and obtained a warrant to search it. The car did not contain any spent casings, bullet holes, or blood, but the police learned that Funches’s girlfriend owned the car. In a subsequent interview, Funches’s girlfriend told Sergeant Kjos that Funches had used the car to drive her to and from work and lunch on September 17, the date of the murder. Two days after the interview with Funches’s girlfriend, Sergeant Kjos questioned Funches. Funches explained that he drove the car to several locations on the morning of September 17 before taking his girlfriend to lunch, and that Hayes had accompanied him for part of the morning. Sergeant Kjos then showed Funches a photograph of DeR-
The next day, the police arrested Hayes and Funches. Sergeant Kjos once again interviewed Funches. This time, Funches provided a different account of the events from the date of the murder. Funches explained that Hayes wanted to purchase marijuana that morning. The two drove around the neighborhood until they eventually picked up DeRonde, who sat in the back seat of the car. As Funches drove, DeRonde handed Hayes a bag of marijuana. Hayes refused to pay for the marijuana, however, because he was dissatisfied with its quality. Once Funches stopped the car, Hayes locked the car doors, which prevented DeRonde from leaving. Hayes then pulled a gun from beneath his clothing and pointed it at DeRonde. Funches told Hayes to let DeRonde go, but Hayes refused to do so. DeRondе eventually opened the ear door on his own and began to leave, at which point Hayes shot DeR-onde. Funches then drove away.
Funches testified against Hayes at the grand jury proceedings and the jury trial that followed. At trial, Funches’s testimony was consistent with the facts contained in his second statement to the police. The jury found Hayes not guilty of first-degree premeditated murder, guilty of first-degree felony murder while committing a drive-by shooting, and guilty of second-degree intentional murder. The district court convicted Hayes of first-degree felony murder while committing a drive-by shooting and sentenced him to life imprisonment with the possibility of release. The court did not adjudicate Hayes’s guilt or sentence him on the count of second-degree intentional murder.
II.
The first question presented by this case is whether the State presented sufficient evidence to support Hayes’s conviction of first-degree felony murder while committing a drive-by shooting. See
A.
To evaluate Hayes’s argument, we must examine and interpret the statute defining the offense of drive-by shooting, which states as follows:
(a) Whoever, while in or having just exited from a motor vehicle, recklessly discharges a firearm at or toward another motor vehicle or a building is guilty of a felony and may be sentenced to imprisonment for not more than three years or to payment of a fine of not more than $6,000, or both.
(b) Any person who violates this subdivision by firing at or toward a person, or an occupied building or motor vehicle, may be sentenced to imprisonment for not more than ten years or to payment of a fine of not more than $20,000, or both.
One reasonable interpretation of
Another reasonable interpretation of
Accordingly, we conclude that
B.
The next step in evaluating Hayes’s argument is to determine whether the evidence presented at Hayes’s trial was sufficient to satisfy the elements of first-degree felony murder while committing a drive-by shooting. See MinmStat.
To obtain Hayes’s conviction of first-degree murder while committing a drive-by shooting, the State was required to
To prove that Hayes committed a drive-by shooting, the State was required to establish beyond a reasonable doubt that: (1) Hayes was in or had just exited a motor vehicle; (2) Hayes recklessly discharged a firearm at or toward another motor vehicle or a building; and (3) Hayes’s offense occurred on September 17, 2010 in Hennepin County. See
The State disagrees, arguing that the evidence presented at trial unequivocally proved that Hayes recklessly discharged a firearm at or toward DeRonde, who qualifies as a “person” under
III.
Notwithstanding our reversal of Hayes’s conviction of first-degree felony murder while committing a drive-by shooting, we must address the second question presented by this case — an evidentiary challenge — because the jury also found Hayes guilty of second-degree intentional murder. More specifically, Hayes argues that the distriсt court erred when it admitted into evidence Funches’s testimony that he was attacked in prison on two separate occasions before Hayes’s trial. In the first incident, two inmates who Funches did not know physically attacked him approximately one month prior to the trial. In the second incident — which occurred several weeks later — a different inmate approached Funches with a small sharp weapon and forced him to write a letter apologizing to Hayes for “lying.” Hayes asserts that Funches’s trial testimony about the threats and physical attacks sus-
“When a defendant fails to object to an alleged error at trial, we review for plain error.” State v. Hill,
The district court did not abuse its discretion by admitting the challenged testimony. “Evidence of witnesses’ fears of testifying and of purрorted threats against witnesses both tend to be relevant to general witness credibility or to explain a witness’s reluctance to testify or inconsistencies in a witness’s story.” State v. McArthur,
The circumstances presented here are nearly identical to those in McArthur. The State elicited the chаllenged testimony to “preempt attacks by the defense” on Funches’s credibility and to explain why Funches wrote letters to his brother and Hayes stating that he lied when he told the police that Hayes shot and killed DeR-onde. In other words, the State introduced Funches’s testimony regarding the threats and attacks to bolster Funches’s credibility by explaining Funches’s prior inconsistent statements, which was the State’s objective when introducing the “fear” testimony in McArthur. Based on McArthur, we conclude that the challеnged testimony in this case was relevant. See generally
We also conclude, based on McAr-thur, that the challenged testimony was not unfairly prejudicial to Hayes. In Mc-Arthur, we concluded that the challenged testimony of the five witnesses was admissible because the district court displayed the proper “sensitivity to the potential for unfair prejudice” in admitting the testimony and “the clear focus of the state’s case was the ample eyewitnеss testimony implicating [the appellant] as the shooter.” 730
Finally, Hayes contends that the district court abused its discretion when it failed to provide a cautionary instruction to the jury on the proper use of the challenged testimony. To be sure, we stated in McArthur that appropriate safeguards, including a cautionary instruction, may be required in some circumstances “to prevent [fear] evidence from being misused” by the jury.
Because we conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in admitting the challenged testimony, we need not, and do not, consider the remaining prongs of the plain-error test. See State v. Pilot,
IV.
For the foregoing reasons, we reverse Hayes’s conviction of first-degree felony murder and remand to the district court with instructions to enter a judgment of conviction and impose sentence on the second-degree intentional murder count.
Reversed and remanded.
Notes
. We recognize that our interpretation leads to the strange result that a person who recklessly shoots at or toward another person while in or having just exited a motor vehicle, without also shooting at or toward a building or another motor vehicle, has not committed the offense of drive-by shooting. But as we have stated, "[i]t is the exclusive province of the [LJegislature to define by statute what acts shall constitute a crime.” State v. Forsman,